Microsoft accounts for the biggest share of the US’ richest individuals in the technology sector this year.

As Facebook, Google and Apple dominate the tech-media headlines, Microsoft is quietly but feverishly making money for its owners.

Bill Gates, Microsoft’s co-founder, former CEO and now new product and technology adviser, is not only the richest on Forbes tech list, but also the richest individual in the whole of the Americas this year.

In a list compiled in October 2014, Forbes calculated that Gates is worth US$81bn., putting him at the top of TechMutiny’s Top 10 Tech Titans ranking.

These are the individuals who made their vast fortunes from inventing and/or investing in innovative digital technology. In seventh place on the tech list (but at No.21 for the whole of the US) is Steve Ballmer, who was Microsoft CEO from 2000 until February of this year, when he retired.

His personal worth is reported to be US$22.2bn, US$2bn of which he recently used to buy the Los Angeles Clippers NBA basketball team. And in ninth place is Paul Allen, Microsoft’s co-founder, who has a personal fortune valued at US$17bn.

This means Microsoft alone accounts for US$120bn, more than one-third (36%) of the US$329.7bn fortune belonging to the US’ Top 10 technology innovators.

In second place of the Top 10, with wealth worth US$48.7bn, is Larry Ellison. Compared to the Apples, the Facebooks and Googles, Ellison is making his money from old but constantly updated computing.

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